Student Mental Health MATTERS!

“1 in 5 children between ages 3 and 17 have a mental, emotional, or behavioral difficulty” (Teaching Tolerance)

I listened to a Teaching Tolerance webinar on student health in which the presenters share why discussing this is important and how to handle mental health in the classroom as a teacher. The most common mental health challenges amongst students are:

1. Anxiety
2. Depression
3. Suicide Ideation
4. ADHD
5. Eating disorders 
6. Overlapping conditions (mental health overlapped with physical disorders,ie. Substance abuse) 

Black Mental health matters→ Suicide rate is twice as high than their white counterparts (Teaching Tolerance)

What can I do as a teacher? As a future educator, I need to know how to handle mental health in the classroom because I need to do everything I can for my students. 

• Educate myself on mental health- spend time reading and researching so I know how to act, and how to help in the classroom relating to mental health.

• Educate the families of students- provide them with support systems that can help them. The school nurse, counselors, school psychologist are all people who can be of aid to the family. 

• Work to remove stigma surrounding mental health, especially in Black communities- breaking down barriers to discuss mental health and promote mental health awareness in the schools.

• Involve community groups in this work

The alarming statistic above on suicide rates leads me to my next point that was discussed in this webinar: Systematic racism in curriculum, culture, and policies. The ways in which I can do this are: 

• Decolonizing curriculum- decolonize the ideologies and dismantle the curriculum to make it relevant to all students of all cultures.

• Know and be mindful of the communities that I am serving- What community am I serving? What do I know about it? What do I know about the people?
  

• Be aware of students who may be at risk of harm because of how they identify- know when to step in and be supportive, watch for injustices in terms of identity in the classroom.

    
I also learned what I should NOT do and this is just as important as learning what I should do. I do not in any way want to harm my students more by acting poorly because I did not do the work on my part to know what I should and should not do. The first thing that I should never do is to try and diagnose my students. This is not my space to do so, that is for people who are educated in that field to give a medical diagnosis. I should also not do this because if I make an assumption as to what the student has, I could be wrong and it is a totally different disorder. So, in conclusion, never diagnose a student in your classroom. Another important thing not to do is to generalize one student's problem and apply that assumption to other students. Each student is different and nobody should be compared to another person.


    In conclusion, I want to touch on a couple things I should do in a bit more detail. I should be checking my bias, that is, to not push any beliefs that I hold or that the school system holds onto the family. I should be there to help them move forward in helping the child and being another support system along with the parents. We should work alongside each other, not against each other.


    I should also be working to create a safe environment for my students that is a place for them to feel that they are trusted and that confidentiality is present. I should never share a student's health complications with another student or to anyone else who is not involved in the matter.